


Care - or Cruelty?

by Bluewolf458



Category: The Sentinel
Genre: Gen, Sentinel Thursday
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-26
Updated: 2017-08-26
Packaged: 2018-12-20 04:25:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,469
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11913171
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bluewolf458/pseuds/Bluewolf458
Summary: A father has kidnapped his son from his ex-wife.





	Care - or Cruelty?

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the Sentinel Thursday prompt 'touch'.  
> Although no archive warnings apply, this is not a very happy story.

Care - or Cruelty?

by Bluewolf

It should have been a touching scene - the relieved mother hugging her three-year-old son after the child was retrieved from the father who had kidnapped him a week earlier. But, watching through the one-way glass of the observation room overlooking the small room where the reunion was taking place, Blair felt uneasy, and he said so.

"I don't understand you!" Simon snapped. "Why on earth would you feel uneasy when a child has been returned to his mother after being kidnapped? You heard what Mrs. Frew said - she was sure her ex had been molesting the boy."

"Jarvis Frew said he wanted his son to be a boy, not kept as a permanent baby by his mother!" Blair argued back. "The kid's nearly four - and he's still wearing diapers, for heaven's sake!"

"Okay, she's maybe been a little... lax about toilet training," Simon admitted, "but that doesn't make her a bad mother, or one who wants her son to stay a baby."

"The kid doesn't seem as happy to see his mother as she is to see him," Blair said. "And that's also bothering me."

"He's still being breast fed," Jim put in quietly.

"Wha- ?" Simon stared at him.

"Okay, she had to have been giving him some solid food too - Frew certainly couldn't have supplied the kid with human milk, and junior wasn't showing any sign of having been starved when the doctor checked him... though he did show some signs of dehydration, and Frew did say he had to show young Sidney how to use a cup - though nobody seemed to pick up on that as indicative of anything; his mother could have had him drinking through a straw rather than risk him dropping a full cup of anything - and that the kid didn't seem to recognize anything but milk as being drinkable. But I can smell it - she doesn't have any younger kids, but she's still producing milk, and the only explanation for that is that her milk production is still being stimulated - and the only way it can be stimulated... "

"It's claimed that breast feeding cements the mother-child bond, so is much better than bottle feeding, and I wouldn't argue with that. And some people say that in the West breast feeding is stopped too early," Blair said. "Certainly the women in some native tribes continue breast feeding until the child is at least two, often older, though some of that is to supplement what else is available. Hard on the mother if food is scarce, but the kid is being fed... and breast feeding is also supposed to act as a sort of contraceptive. Not a particularly effective one, though."

"I think I want a word with Frew," Jim said. "That 'baby' comment of his is worrying me."

***

He and Blair met up with the arrested father about half an hour later.

"Ah, Mr. Frew," Jim said.

Frew looked at him, a hopeless look on his face. He clearly didn't expect any kind of sympathetic interrogation.

"I've been looking through the report handed in by the police who arrested you, and there are one or two things... Although she retained the name Frew, you and your wife divorced nearly a year ago."

"Yes."

"Can you tell me why?"

"It turned out... she never wanted a husband, just a child. Once she had her child... She wouldn't share my bed, even my bedroom. She slept in the nursery. At first I thought it was just an over-developed maternal instinct, wanting to be there in case Sidney needed her during the night, but by the time he was a year old I realized I'd never had a wife, just a legal... mistress, I suppose, and we divorced, reasonably amicably, about a year later. Being a divorced mother was more respectable than being an unmarried one." There was a hopeless note in Frew's voice.

"But you kept in touch?"

"He's my son too, and I love him."

"When she reported Sidney missing, she claimed you were molesting him," Jim said.

"No way! But after we split... I suspected her of... well, abusing him. But who ever believes a mother would abuse her child?"

"There are different kinds of abuse," Blair murmured. "The parent who never tells a child 'No'. That's abuse. The parent who gives the child everything he asks for. That's abuse."

Frew looked at him, and for the first time they saw a touch of hope in his eyes. "I never thought I'd meet a cop who understood that."

"Why did you kidnap him?" Jim asked, and the sympathy in his voice was clear.

"She's keeping him a baby." It was what he'd told the arresting officers.

""Nearly four, and he's still in diapers, still being breast fed," Blair said. "How well can he walk?"

"Not well at all. He mostly crawls when he's in the house. Outside, he walks, but only holding her hand. I heard her tell him it was safer - that he wasn't old enough yet to be able to walk on his own, that he could fall and hurt himself. That... that was when I decided to get him away from her."

"Frankly, I don't blame you," Blair said.

"What about talking?" Jim asked.

"He was just beginning to talk to me the morning the police came, but certainly not at a four-year-old level. I think she discourages him -  because if he can talk intelligibly it shows he isn't a baby any longer."

"All right. She's accusing you of molesting him. I suggest you file a counter accusation of abuse, on the grounds that at his age he should be walking and talking adequately and confidently, and he should certainly be toilet trained." He hesitated. "Of course, he could be autistic. That could explain a lot."

"No," Frew said. "I just had him for a week, but the improvement in that time... It's not that he can't, it's that she didn't let him."

"The breast feeding is a little less hard and fast," Blair put in. "The World Health Organization recommends that all babies are breast fed for up to two years or longer, and in some countries, some cultures, up to three years isn't uncommon. She could argue that he gets health benefits from it. But it won't be that long before he's school age, and if he goes to school still breast feeding - can you imagine the ridicule he'd get? If necessary, push that and the 'still wearing diapers' as proof that she's not letting him grow up, and not letting him grow up is cruelty."

***

With Jim's help, Social Services was involved, and agreed that the way young Sidney was being cared for - over-cared for - by his mother was a form of cruelty. Sidney managed to say that he didn't want to be with Mom, that the man he'd been with for a few days let him do things Mom didn't, like run around in the house and drink from a cup, and it was decided to let Jarvis Frew have the care of his son, under supervision at first. The boy's mother got visiting rights, but only in the presence of a third party.

However, after a few months it became clear that Sidney didn't want to see his mother and was much happier with his father. With his ability to talk more suited to his age, the day came when he told her to "Go away!"

Sobbing unhappily, Anne Frew agreed to remove herself from her son's life. Her ex-husband promised to keep her informed of Sidney's welfare and progress, and she was escorted away.

Sidney watched her go, then turned to his father. "Why?" he asked.

Jarvis Frew shook his head helplessly.

Blair, there that day as an additional chaperone, said quietly, "Some mothers don't want their children ever to grow up. They want their children always depending on them. Why? Nobody knows. But you're with your Dad now, and he wants to see you growing up, running around, having fun.

"Your Mom will get help, and one day she might even ask if you'll visit her, and be glad to see that you're a big boy, not a baby."

Sidney shook his head. "She didn't like it today."

"She has a kind of illness," Blair said. "The doctors will help her. And when she gets better she'll be happy you're all grown up."

He didn't really believe that - he didn't want to upset the boy but he couldn't see Anne Frew ever getting past the need to devote her life to caring for a totally dependent baby. And he knew Jarvis Frew thought that too.

There would certainly be a happy ending for Jarvis and Sidney; it was unlikely that there would ever be a happy ending for Anne.

 

 

 


End file.
